In Plaza Murillo, the guts of Bolivia’s political capital, La Paz – and residential to the presidential palace, parliament and the nation’s most important Catholic cathedral – time could also be operating out for a clock that runs backwards.
Put in atop of the congressional palace through the years of prosperity underneath former president Evo Morales, 65, the anti-clockwise timepiece was conceived as an emblem of the “decolonial and anti-imperialist” worldview championed by the left.
Nevertheless it has since develop into an emblem of the decline of Morales’s Movimiento al Socialismo (Mas) celebration – with some saying that, because the nation faces its worst financial disaster in 40 years, Bolivia itself has been shifting backwards.
And when 7.9 million Bolivians head to the polls this Sunday to decide on their subsequent president, Mas not solely dangers shedding energy after practically 20 years – nevertheless it might disappear as a political pressure altogether.
Polls level to a possible runoff between two rightwing candidates: the centre-right enterprise tycoon and former planning minister Samuel Doria Medina, 66, adopted intently by Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga, 65, a rightwing former president who briefly led the nation in 2001 after the resignation of the previous dictator Hugo Banzer.
The deeply unpopular present president, Luis Arce – a former finance minister underneath Morales who wrested management of Mas from his former mentor – opted to not search re-election and as an alternative nominated his 36-year-old minister of presidency, Eduardo del Castillo.
Not like earlier elections wherein Morales after which Arce secured outright first-round victories with over 50% of the vote, Del Castillo is now polling beneath 3%, the minimal threshold for a celebration to stay eligible to contest future elections.
“Arce will go down in historical past because the one who buried the ‘father’, seized the celebration and, in all chance, led it to its finish,” stated the political and financial analyst Gonzalo Chávez Alvarez, a professor on the Universidad Católica Boliviana.
Though polling in Bolivia has traditionally proved unreliable, the prospect of a celebration that was as soon as hegemonic now teetering on the point of oblivion is something however trivial.
“I can guess we received’t lose our authorized standing,” Arce instructed the Guardian late on Thursday, arguing that polls did not predict his first-round victory in 2020.
Even so, the president confirmed little confidence in any shock from the left and stated he would respect the consequence if the suitable received. “If they’re democratically elected, why not settle for it?” he stated. “And we’ll mobilise to withstand, to be the opposition, in fact.”
“I had excessive hopes for this authorities however now I solely really feel disappointment,” stated Pablo Quispe, 55, who has bought hats for the previous 25 years in a avenue market in El Alto – a booming high-altitude metropolis close to La Paz that was as soon as a Mas stronghold.
After years of prosperity pushed by a pure fuel growth, reserves dwindled through the closing years of Morales’s presidency, triggering an financial disaster that has deepened ever since.
“The fuel that ought to have sustained the nation for for much longer – after which generated assets to be invested in different sectors, diversifying the financial system – wasn’t used that approach,” stated Alvarez.
Beneath Arce, the financial system has deteriorated additional: by July 2025, annual inflation had reached 24.8%, the very best stage since no less than 2008. Simply as Bolivia celebrates 200 years of independence, there are shortages of gasoline and US {dollars}, resulting in scarcities and lengthy queues even for bread.
“Every little thing is costlier, and we’re barely getting by,” stated Quispe, who beforehand voted for Masbut now plans to vote for Medina as a result of “the left simply isn’t working any extra”.
Leticia Guarachi Padilla, a 35-year-old leftist entrepreneur who runs a small enterprise putting in blinds and curtains, plans to spoil her poll in protest over Morales’s exclusion from the race.
The primary Indigenous president in Bolivia’s historical past and the nation’s longest-serving chief, from 2006 to 2019, Morales was barred by the constitutional court docket, which dominated that he has already exceeded the two-term restrict, and the electoral court docket, which has argued that his celebration shouldn’t be formally registered.
Since October, he has remained entrenched in central Bolivia, the place tons of of coca farmers have prevented police from executing an arrest warrant issued in opposition to him over allegations that he fathered a toddler with a 15-year-old whereas in workplace.
In current weeks, Morales has urged supporters to solid clean votes – claiming that if the variety of spoiled ballots exceeds the share received by the highest candidate, it will imply he had received.
The best-polling leftwing title is that of Andrónico Rodríguez, a 36-year-old senator, polling third to fifth.
As soon as seen as Morales’s pure inheritor because of his Indigenous roots and management within the coca growers’ union, Rodríguez was labelled a traitor by his former mentor after deciding to launch his personal candidacy and has appeared unable to rally help from the fragmented left.
“I voted for Evo each time he ran, and I don’t remorse it as a result of he promoted structural adjustments that favoured the poorest,” stated Padilla, who acknowledged the previous president’s “issues”, together with “his relationships with underage ladies and the truth that he sees himself as a saviour, pushed extra by ego”. However she nonetheless believes he ought to have run.
“Voting for Doria or Quiroga means voting for imperialism and for the US to retake management of Bolivia,” she stated.
If no candidate wins greater than 50% of the vote, or no less than 40% with a 10-point lead over the runner-up, a second spherical will likely be held on 19 October, which might be unprecedented within the nation’s historical past.
Doria and Quiroga are operating for the fourth time, however nonetheless current themselves as political outsiders. Each advocate spending cuts as their most important technique to deal with the financial disaster.
Quiroga says he would prioritise relations with the US, whereas Medina has promised to revive the availability of {dollars} and gasoline inside 100 days.
His marketing campaign slogan is “100 días, carajo” (100 days, dammit), a reference to not the Argentine president Javier Milei’s libertarian rallying cry “Viva la libertad, carajo!” (Lengthy reside freedom, dammit!), however to the 2005 aircraft crash Medina survived, after which he stated: “Carajo, no me puedo morir” (I can’t die, dammit!).
Driving a bike adorned with marketing campaign flags, automotive engineer Juan Pablo Rodríguez, 28, attended Medina’s closing rally in La Paz on Tuesday together with his spouse, Michelle López, additionally 28, and their one-year-old daughter. “Samuel can repair the disaster as a result of he’s a terrific businessman,” he stated.
Considered one of Bolivia’s wealthiest males, with a fortune in cement, hospitality and quick meals, Medina instructed the Guardian that if elected, he plans to revive the Plaza Murillo clock to its unique, clockwise course: “Rationality will return, eventually.” The present clock, he stated, symbolised a rustic “shifting backwards”.
The clock – with the quantity 12 nonetheless on the high, however with palms turning to the left to rely the hours – was put in in 2014 on the initiative of David Choquehuanca, then overseas minister underneath Morales and now vice-president underneath Arce.
He claimed it was a method to affirm Bolivia’s id as a “southern nation”, arguing {that a} southern hemisphere sundial shadow strikes left.
However physicist Francesco Zaratti, an emeritus professor on the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, has lengthy argued the clock “makes no scientific sense”, noting that in Bolivia the shadow can typically transfer proper.
“When we’ve got a brand new president, I guess it’ll be one of many first issues to go, as a symbolic finish to Mas’s 20-year cycle in energy,” stated Zaratti.
Grover Quispe Lima, 35, seems on the clock day by day as he sells maize to feed the tons of of pigeons in Plaza Murillo. He has been walloped by the disaster, with maize costs rising from 120 (£13) to 200 (£21) bolivianos in a yr.
“To me, it’s irrelevant whether or not the clock strikes backwards or forwards – the one factor that issues is that the subsequent president improves our nation,” he stated.
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